“The Civil Rights Movement and the Nine-Word Problem” Professional Development Opportunity

As she prepared to close Laurel Fall Camp for Girls, a camp she ran from 1925–1948, Lillian Smith wrote, “I hope that the idea of Laurel Falls will not die. I want to believe that we have started a chain reaction of dreams that will go on touching child after child in our South.” The Lillian E. Smith Center’s programs, specifically its annual P-12 professional development program for regional educators, continues Smith’s goal of starting that chain reaction that will impact children and communities not just in the South by nationally and globally. Last year, we hosted our first institute, “The Civil Rights Movement in Northeast Georgia,” and this year, we are preparing to host our second annual institute, “The Civil Rights Movement and the Nine-Word Problem.”

During the week-long institute, participants will have sessions with Dr. Rev. Benjamin Boswell, Dr. Keri Leigh Merritt, and Dr. Jennifer Morrison, among environmental science activities with faculty from Piedmont University. They will explore the Civil Rights Movement beyond what the Southern Poverty Law Center calls “the nine-word problem” of confining the movement to “Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King, I Have a Dream.” Participants will do this by looking at works by Lillian Smith, Pauli Murray, Ernest Gaines, and Martin Luther King, Jr…